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Why More Indiana School Districts Have Not Consolidated

October 3, 2013 | 8:55 AM

Rockville High School is part of the newly-created North Central Parke School Corporation. The Turkey Run and Rockville districts 'reorganized,' merging administrative staffs and school boards, but did not combine the district's two high schools.

Since the the nation’s one-room schoolhouses began banding together a century ago — and as the districts they formed have merged and merged again — Stateline’s Maggie Clark points out the number of school districts in the U.S. has been dwindling for generations.

But after dropping from more than 108,000 school districts in 1942 to under 13,000 in the U.S. today, Clark writes the once-precipitous decline in that number has slowed.

This, despite proddings from political leaders in Indiana and elsewhere. Though Gov. Daniels commissioned a report in 2007 effectively calling on dozens of districts to consolidate, Stateline reports the number of Indiana districts has dropped by only two since then.

“For states, consolidating school districts can mean fewer buildings to maintain and lower administrative costs,” Clark writes. “For communities, consolidation can mean long bus rides for students, losing budgetary control and even a loss of community history.”

“When you consolidate — and people hate to think about this — but when you consolidate, one of the main things that saves revenue is you get rid of one of the two high schools,” Purdue economist Larry Deboer told StateImpact.

North Central Parke is one of more than 160 Indiana school districts whose enrollments remain below a “minimum” enrollment target of 2,000 students recommended in that 2007 report Gov. Daniels commissioned. (It’s called the Kernan-Shepard Report.)

More than 50 school districts in the state enroll fewer than 1,000 students.

When a team from IU’s Center for Evaluation and Education Policy explored the subject in 2010, the researchers looked into district finances, but also compared students’ academic performance in smaller and larger districts. The CEEP team concluded districts were better served by working with neighboring schools to set up shared purchasing agreements or split administrative duties.

“A compelling case does not exist for mandated school corporation consolidation,” the researchers wrote. “Perhaps a stronger case exists for deconsolidation of the state’s largest districts.”

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Terry Howell Coons

When I moved back to my husband’s hometown in Indiana 23 years ago I was shocked that there were three school corporations in tiny Montgomery County. I am still shocked that there still are. Where I grew up in Florida, Pasco County(north of Tampa/Clearwater) there was 1 school corporation, 1 superintendent and 7 school board members. When I graduated in 1982 there were 5 high schools and 8-10 junior highs and probably 20 elementary schools. Now there are appx 15 high schools and an enormous amount of junior highs and elementary schools. There is still only one superintendent. He/She does not micromanage the principals of the schools as I have noticed is mostly the case here in Montgomery County. We don’t need to consolidate schools as much as we need to consolidate corporations. There doesn’t need to be three superintendents for the amount of kids who go to school here. There could be a huge savings in administration costs. I love the schools that my 5 children attend, but some of that administration budget would benefit the students greatly if we were only paying one large amount to a superintendent instead of 3 large amounts to 3 people.

I am in no way a Mitch Daniels fan, and I am a great supporter of Glenda Ritz, but in some ways this was the only thing he ever said that really could have helped our kids.